This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

Edible nail polish? It’s finger lickin’ weird: Menon

It’s as if the captains of industry are now mad scientists. These lunatics keep unleashing shame in R&D labs, cackling into beakers of folly and mixing things that should never be mixed. You know, like a mattress that detects cheating. Or a sex theme park. It won’t be long before someone markets an umbrella that fills out the census or a coffee table that actually makes coffee.

The worst bad idea yet arrived this week when KFC decided to combine chicken with nail polish: “Simply apply and dry like regular nail polish and then lick — again and again and again to taste why the world’s favourite chicken is Finger Lickin’ Good.”

Yes, then tuck into a Big Crunch while recalling the friends you lost.

As a general life rule, you should never eat anything that’s packaged as “Edible.” When you buy eggs, that word is not stamped on the carton. At the grocery store, no one asks, “Hey, are these apples edible? What about them crackers? Edible?”

Article Continued Below

“Edible” is only imprinted on products — paint, spoons, undies — that do not belong to a food group. Unless you are explicitly told it is “edible,” you wouldn’t swallow a comb or nibble on a doorknob. But even if you are told, basic instinct should guide what goes in your mouth.

And I can think of nothing more revolting than chicken nail polish. Yeah, yeah, I get the finger lickin’ tie-in. But slogans are not supposed to be literal. After all these years, my cat has never once asked for Meow Mix by name. Ask any parent if Disneyland is really the happiest place on earth. There will be tears.

Do your Energizer batteries keep going and going and going?

No, eventually they need to be replaced.

That’s exactly what should happen to the KFC execs who brainstormed this disgusting biohazard. Does that secret blend of 11 herbs and spices include marijuana? Is that what these chuckleheads are smoking? Have they not spent any time on public transit? We already have an epidemic of questionable hygiene. We don’t need people jonesing for drumsticks during rush hour, hogging three seats and madly licking themselves like drunk primates.

What’s really frightening is the fast food industry is built on imitation. It’s like this $590 billion game of copycat. So if Edible Nail Polish is a hit in the Hong Kong test market, don’t be surprised if other companies release equally repulsive products.

Do you want to live in a world in which your neighbour lounges in her backyard, slurping Beef Crunchy Taco Supreme Sun Tan Lotion off her elbow? Or be in a meeting when a colleague removes his shoe and gnaws on a Big Mac Insole?

Ancient cosmetics were made of olives and rosewater and castor oil because that’s all there was. We have perfectly good chemicals. We regress at great peril by embracing an era of Whopper Moisturizer, Bacon Poutine Rouge, Turtle Pecan Cluster Blizzard Balm and Ghost Pepper Fries Hairspray.

And of all the places to encourage people to lick their fingers ... Hong Kong? Really, KFC? Chicken nail polish in a region that had an outbreak ofbird flu? What’s next? Mutant 18-Piece Buckets of Original Recipe for Chernobyl? A Toasted Twister Antiperspirant for the Tornado Belt?

Maybe KFC is hedging its marketing bets with Hong Kong, knowing it’s like 13,000 kilometres away from Louisville headquarters, a distance that should prevent any mass protests after Kowloon ERs bulge with people who accidentally blinded themselves by rubbing Hot & Spicy into their eyes.

Or maybe KFC figures Hong Kong is not yet wise to bad ideas.

The same certainly can’t be said for North America. Just this week, as Edible Nail Polish made headlines, Google and Fiat-Chrysler announced plans to build a self-driving minivan. I’m sorry, what? Driving a minivan is the only good thing about owning a minivan. Take the driving away and now I’m locked inside a prison on wheels. Am I supposed to play with the cup holders? Open and close the glove box?

Then again, if beauty-foods become a trend, maybe it’ll be better to curl up in the back seat and watch Fast Food Nation as my daughters lick their delicious nails, my wife applies a fresh coat of quesadilla mascara and our invisible chauffeur drives us toward the end of days.

More from the Toronto Star & Partners

LOADING

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com